MSUM Society of Physics Students

For academic year 2013-14 these following officers will serve for our chapter:

President Tyler Lane
Vice President Dana Koczur
Historian Anthony Woltman
Treasurer Kyle Salk

Hollee Johnson, Thomas Rydeen, andTyler Lane were inducted into the Sigma Pi Sigma this year. Congratulations you all!

Joe Herbst, Sustainability Coordinator at the Office of Sustainability, talked with SPS members about interesting sustainable ideas to be utilized around campus. If a student has an idea that the Office of Sustainability might be interested in, or if it is related to sustainability, they can come talk to him and he can grant funding for the idea. These ideas would be utilized around campus to raise awareness of science – particularly the energy-conscious side of it.

Members also talked about the upcoming SPS Zone 11 Meeting (March 1 to March 2) here at MSUM.

The Physics Demo show put on by members of the Society of Physics Students (SPS) was this Sunday, February 17.

There were numerous experiments carried out in the demo show, which started at 3:30 pm.  The experiments done in the show follow:

• Tyler Lane (SPS President) conducted an early demonstration of making a comet using earthly materials, including dry ice, dirt, water, corn syrup, and ammonia.
• Nick (SPS Treasurer) demonstrated Non-Newtonian fluids on a speaker with varying frequencies.
• Nick also demonstrated induction by a magnet in a long metallic pipe versus a non-magnetic material dropped down the same pipe.
• Aaron (SPS Vice-President) experimented with incoming radio signals being blocked in a Faraday cage.
• Meredith demonstrated walking on cartons of eggs without them cracking.
• Meredith then stood and then laid down upon a bed of nails.
• Meredith and Aaron engulfed several items (including fruits, candies, flowers, and plastics) in liquid nitrogen to show the effects of flash-freezing on these objects, and then proceeded to smash these items.
• Tyler and Meredith fit as many balloons as possible into a container of liquid nitrogen, finally obtaining around 12 in the container at once.
• Tyler and Aaron capped off the show by demonstrating the explosive powers of helium, hydrogen, and hydrogen-oxygen filled balloons.

Afterward, anyone was welcome to come up to the front of the stage where Wes and Nick had a hands-on activity with non-Newtonian fluids. Tony and Dana froze leftover items with liquid nitrogen. Aaron heated a small barrel filled partially with water to show an implosion effect, but the barrel wasn’t able to be sealed entirely from the outside, so unfortunately, the experiment wasn’t successful.

The entire show emphasized showing interesting experiments in science – and engaging the audience by asking them what they’d expect to happen. While interesting experiments were undertaken, the theory behind them was stressed as well as producing an entertaining show.

The meeting focused on the upcoming Physics show on February 17, 2013.  It was decided that there would be two pre-event meetings, one on Saturday and one before the actual show, to ensure that the experiments could be done and would be possible for the demo show on February 17, 2013. SPS T-shirts were also sold to all members.

Members discussed potential experiments for the Physics Demo show. Larry Schwartz, the Collection Development Librarian at Livingston Lord Library, discussed accessing scientific articles and the Hagen Technical Library.

Members decided to meet every Thursday until March 1. The Physics demo show will be held on February 17 in SL 104 at 3:30 pm.

Folks, we will meet in Hagen 314 today at 5 pm.

Dear All:
I hope you had a nice winter break and now you’re all getting ready for another busy semester ahead. The MSUM SPS has arranged a career workshop for those who are interested in applying to summer internship programs. The workshop will be held on Wednesday, January 16 at 5 pm in Hagen 325.

Sincerely,
Shouvik Bhattacharya

On behalf of the MSUM SPS I wish you all a good luck on your finals.